Summer as going very well and I was enjoying being pregnant (for the most part). I was lucky and was able to take vacation from work 1 week after the 4^th of July so I had a nice relaxing two weeks off from work. The first day following vacation, I returned to work (veterinary technician). I had noticed around 10 am that morning that my lower back had to started to ache a bit. I figured this was the beginning of aching, tired portion of 3^rd tri and didn’t think too much about it. I took some Tylenol and went on about my day. Around 11:30am, I noticed that the Tylenol wasn’t helping much so I tried sitting/standing different positions to no avail. I called my OB at this point to see if they had any suggestions or if there was anything else that I could take. While talking to the receptionist, she put me on hold and came back a few minutes later and said that my doctor recommended that I come in and get checked to make sure I wasn’t dehydrated. So, I went on my lunch break (her office is right across the street from where I worked) thinking it would be a quick appointment. I showed up, they put a fetal monitor on me and we came to find out that I was having contractions every 2-3 minutes. Next thing I know, I’m hooked up to an IV and having my cervix checked with luckily no change. Andy came from work and we sat at the hospital for about 8 hours. During that 8 hour hospital visit (which was my first visit EVER to a hospital), they gave me two bags of fluids in about an hours time (man did I have to pee!) and terbutaline to stop the contractions. The terb. wasn’t too horrible, it did make my heart race a bit (it could have also been the surreal situation that we were in at the time, we were both slightly nervous about what was happening). This is one of those situations in which my personality really shows through…I can honestly say, even though we were sitting in the hospital, I wasn’t too worried. I didn’t really know at this point that this was just the beginning. I just thought it was a fluke.